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Ethanol, Do you Avoid Using Gas Containing Ethanol?

Given a choice I'll buy non-ethanol, but we travel a fair amount and generally buy what is at hand when we need fuel
 
It looks like in our town, the Canadian Tire Gas Bar premium is ethanol free.

If they are all like that, that is good for us here because that chain is well distributed.

I have unconfirmed indications in Ontario that Shell V Power is ethanol free.

I plan to start checking for stickers on the pumps as I travel around for work, I believe the thing to beware of is one reading E10. I assume the E is ethanol, the number is the maximum percent content?
 
Given a choice I'll buy non-ethanol, but we travel a fair amount and generally buy what is at hand when we need fuel

Speaking of which, i need a good source on the E10 or the E15 cure all. my bike runs so much better when i use it, i ride all winter and sometimes the fuel is really bad. thanks folks.
 
Yes, will avoid it if possible. It is utter nonsense that we have to pay up to $.50 cents a gallon more to avoid a product that should not exist in the first place. What ever you do, do not mix ethanol gas in a two-stroke and let it sit for any length of time. Phase separation occurs in as little as 4 weeks, I have seen and dealt with it.
 
Yes, I avoid Ethanol when I can. In Iowa it's easy to avoid, as the pumps are well marked and a lot of stations have Ethanol free gas.
On trips it's hard to avoid, not all pumps are marked and some states have mostly E10 gas.
When we return to Iowa I always make sure to make the last fillup with Ethanol free gas. I don't like the stuff sitting in the tank and fuel system for long periods.
 
I have not even seen fuel without either Ethanol or MTBE (now outlawed) for probably 30 years. Guess I need to travel farther east more often.......{I have over 250,000 miles on bikes since '91, all with oxygenated fuels, and no issues and mpg is still in the 43-45 range. I tend to mix smaller batches and shake well for my chainsaw and weedeater that are still 2-strokes}
 
Last I saw was $4.809 for the Ethanol free stuff around here. Won't be buying that anytime soon.
Jeff
 
It looks like in our town, the Canadian Tire Gas Bar premium is ethanol free.

If they are all like that, that is good for us here because that chain is well distributed.

I have unconfirmed indications in Ontario that Shell V Power is ethanol free.

I plan to start checking for stickers on the pumps as I travel around for work, I believe the thing to beware of is one reading E10. I assume the E is ethanol, the number is the maximum percent content?

In Canada, all of our gasoline has some Ethanol in it, the premiums have Ethanol but usually below 5% which is the limit before it needs to be disclosed. Some of the big chains will deny that they "add" Ethanol but the reality is they buy their fuel from all the same distribution points, some times called the "rack" and will add their proprietary additive at the rack for their specific products.

Indeed, E10 is 10% Ethanol while B10 in diesel is 10% renewable resource fuel or Bio-Diesel if you will.

I can categorically say that all fuel in Canada has at least 2% renewable resource content and it has been that way since we elected Harper.

If you ever wondered why you have better fuel economy with fuel from the US, they have better quality fuel with higher energy content. The US imports a great deal of our refined fuel it goes right out of our borders and we get what's left, about 10% of total refinery production in Canada.

The US Army did a study of NATO Country Member fuel quality and Canada barely met the criteria for refined products sold at retail. I guess that means we don't have to worry about our neighbour to the south invading us because those big tanks would barely run on our fuel. They certainly can't get to the Arctic where we use Russian fuel because it's cheaper to import and distribute from Arctic ports than build a pipeline to them. Now Russian fuel is a completely different story and not a good one.
 
On the coast,we've got a fair amount of EtOH free places- boats need it.

So we use it in all the yard equipment (got about 30 gallons on hand) - 2 stroke and 4 stroke. Chainsaw, weedeater, trimmers, blowers, tractor, etc

Bikes get what we pick up while riding. Once away from the coast finding EtOH free is not as easy.

EtOH containing fuel is a pure scam and nothing more than subsidy to big ag interests. It produces only slightly more energy than the fuel it takes to farm it, make it and distribute it so contributes almost nothing to energy independence from the mideast with the resulting very expensive military actions that never seem to end. Shale oil and fracking can actually do something useful in that regard assuming they can be done with acceptable environmental impacts.It is in fact the US military that is driving a lot of the govt thinking re energy policy.

(I am no expert in what's coming out of the tar sands and on the pipeline issues but have hear they're using benzene as a diluent for pumping- if so that is troubling because benzene is a well established higher level carcinogen than many other petro chemicals)

Got no experiences whatever with Russian fuel- and it sounds like that's a good thing especially if they do fuel as well as they do nuclear reactor designs.
 
Now Russian fuel is a completely different story and not a good one.

THANKS..........Really..........You saved this from becoming another tire, oil, ethanol, fuel treatment thread. More information about Ruski fuel, import, export, quality, pricing, and use would be interesting........THANKS.......God bless.......Dennis
 
I plan to run some in my R1100RS now that a local (10 miles out of my way) station has it available. I just want to see if there is a noticeable difference. If there is, I may keep some on hand in the garage to top the bike off with, but on the road around here it isn't easy to find. I will definitely be filling up with it (+ stabilizer) for winter storage.

I've been buying VP fuel for off season 2 stroke storage mix, but now that I can get ethanol free from the pump I'll just be buying that to mix with year round.

It does cost an extra dollar / gallon, but I don't go through enough two stroke mix to make a difference. Anyway, the VP premix was $9 / quart so I'll probably be ahead paying the pump price and mixing my own over the course of a year since I won't be buying 2 or three quarts of the VP in the fall.
 
I have unconfirmed indications in Ontario that Shell V Power is ethanol free.

According to their FAQ shell supplies "Top Tier" fuel (at least in the US). The "Top Tier" standard says "Contain enough denatured ethanol such that the actual ethanol content is no less than 8.0 and no more than 10.0 volume percent."

Found a link. http://www.toptiergas.com/retailers.html

If you see an ethanol free sign on any of the listed brands/locations they are lying about something, either the lack of ethanol or being "Top Tier".
 
I suppose I'd give it a try if I ran across some but according to pure-gas.org the closest non-marina ethanol-free gas is 40 miles in a direction I seldom go. Zero ethanol-free stations listed in Delaware or New Jersey. I too feel it's a political gift to connected parties and fails the cost/benefit test but at this point I think rolling it back is a lost cause and stopping E15 is probably the best the user community can hope for. I use my bike enough that my fuel stays fresh without additives so phase separation etc. aren't an issue for me. Even if mileage goes up 10%, if I have to pay 10% more for ethanol-free there's no cost benefit. The fuel system is designed to deal with it. I don't feel like the effort to find (and pay extra for!) ethanol-free would benefit the bike enough to be useful.

Obviously, YMMV :rofl
 
I didn't think that there were any sources of ethanol-free gasoline in New York, but apparently there are some:

http://pure-gas.org/

That site has information, state-by-state, or a map showing all locations.

Harry
 
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